Current debates in urban theory: A critical assessment

Michael Storper and Allen Scott

Urban Studies, 2016, vol. 53, issue 6, 1114-1136

Abstract: Urban studies today is marked by many active debates. In an earlier paper, we addressed some of these debates by proposing a foundational concept of urbanisation and urban form as a way of identifying a common language for urban research. In the present paper we provide a brief recapitulation of that framework. We then use this preliminary material as background to a critique of three currently influential versions of urban analysis, namely, postcolonial urban theory, assemblage theoretic approaches and planetary urbanism. We evaluate each of these versions in turn and find them seriously wanting as statements about urban realities. We criticise (a) postcolonial urban theory for its particularism and its insistence on the provincialisation of knowledge, (b) assemblage theoretic approaches for their indeterminacy and eclecticism and (c) planetary urbanism for its radical devaluation of the forces of agglomeration and nodality in urban-economic geography.

Keywords: agglomeration theory; assemblage theory; planetary urbanisation theory; post-colonial urbanism; urban theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (53)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0042098016634002 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:53:y:2016:i:6:p:1114-1136

DOI: 10.1177/0042098016634002

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Urban Studies from Urban Studies Journal Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().